Andy Burnham pulls off powerful first assembly with Donald Trump — and evens wins his praises

Andy Burnham, who only became Prime Minister in July, said he and Donald Trump made a “good connection” during talks after the UN General Assembly in New York City

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Andy Burnham pulled off a tricky first meeting with Donald Trump last night as the mercurial US President said he was a man to do business with.

The Prime Minister said the leaders had made a “good connection” during talks on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, where he appeared to have found a way through the minefield of tricky issues on the table, including the Middle East, the Falklands, and Ukraine.

But despite warm words, the pair clearly had their differences. Mr Trump lashed out again at the “terrible deal” for the UK to hand over the sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius – and said the PM had agreed to look at it again, to which Mr Burnham nodded in agreement.

The PM also hinted he had challenged Mr Trump behind closed doors over the Falkland islands, after he recently suggested he would not help the UK in any potential future conflict with Argentina.

The tone of the meeting came as a relief to British officials, who had been nervous about how the unpredictable US President would react to Mr Burnham. He previously dismissed him as the “mayor of some town” and “liberal”.

Instead, Mr Trump lavished praise on the PM at the end of their 40-minute meeting. Mr Trump said: “I think he’s a natural businessperson. We have had a lot of discussions. He gets it. He understands what he has to do”.

The US President couldn’t resist a jibe at Keir Starmer after relations deteriorated dramatically over the ex-PM’s refusal to join Trump’s disastrous Iran war.

Pressed on whether UK-US relations were up or down, Mr Trump replied: “No, I think they’re up. Well they’re more up now than they were with your last prime minister, let me put it that way. I think right now, based on my relationship with the Prime Minister, Andy, I think that, I think we’re doing very well.”

Mr Trump later claimed Mr Starmer’s rhetoric on Russia was “too tough” in a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

In a light-hearted moment, Mr Burnham made a gentle dig at Donald Trump for referring to Manchester as a “some town”. Asked whether he was happier in Manchester or Manhattan, the PM said: “Oh, that’s a risky question.”

Mr Trump interjected: “Do you want to go first?” The PM added: “I like to remind the President every now and again he called the great city of Manchester… you once called it some town. I don’t hold it against you as the former Mayor. Obviously, I’m very much at home in Makerfield, Manchester, but here too. I love coming here.”

Mr Burnham also said he had set out his hopes of turning things around at home to the US President, saying “Britain has been in too much turbulence in a sense of not knowing where we are going”.

“I said we’re going to lay out a plan for Britain – a 10-year direction,” he said. “The country has got so much going for it and it’s time to turn the story about Britain to a positive story – get some hopefulness going around the country.”

The meeting came ahead of Mr Burnham’s debut speech to the UN on Tuesday night, where he said he would “stem the poisonous tide” of disinformation and divisive rhetoric being pushed by hostile actors online.

The PM said jobless youngsters and people struggling with the cost of living were particularly vulnerable to manipulated information from the Kremlin designed to sow despair.

“We’re talking about an insidious campaign that reaches into people’s homes and twists what they feel about their own country and community – creating a narrative of decline, stoking division and sowing despair,” he said.

“On top of that we have seen cyber-attacks on our companies and institutions. And we know that AI will multiply the threat.”

The Prime Minister has ordered security chiefs to stand up a new National Centre for Information Defence to detect, attribute and disrupt the “industrial scale assault by hostile actors on the information environment in the UK and many of our allies.”

He added: “We have tiptoed around this for too long. Over the last decade we have given too much ground to those who want to run a negative, corrosive narrative about life in Britain, which bears no resemblance to reality. Well, no more.

“We are going to face the new decade in a different way – with our eyes wide open. We are going to be much prouder in standing up for our values and the rule of law. And we are going to help our people to strengthen their resilience – because faced with this information warfare, security starts in every home.

“If you’re struggling with the cost of living and your life is not improving – or if you’re a young person not in employment, education or training – then you are going to be much more vulnerable to this kind of influence. So part of the challenge is to lift our people up and create the opportunities they need.

“When inequalities grow too wide, our societies are at greater risk. So we will work to make life more affordable. That will be at the heart of a new 10-year Plan for Britain that we will bring forward later in the year.”

The UK will launch an international effort to establish global standards on AI, the PM told the UN.

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